the landing light
by eyesontheskyline
Summary: Nathaniel's sabbatical is rudely interrupted by the death of his father, & Rebecca wants to be there for him. Set nine months into the one year time skip in the finale.
1. Chapter 1

It's Darryl who tells her that Nathaniel Plimpton Senior is dead – he appears in the back room of Rebetzels while she's unpacking a delivery and asks if she heard the news about Nathaniel's dad. "No," she says cautiously, although her body seems to have an idea of what's coming – her heart speeds up, her palms starting to sweat.

"He died," Darryl says, all wide eyes and stricken expression. "I just heard from White Josh who just heard from Nathaniel – he's back in LA, dealing with all the…" Darryl waves a hand around vaguely, which she takes to mean _unpleasantness_.

"Shit," she breathes. "Is Nathaniel okay?"

He raises his hands in a surrender gesture. "You know what I know," he says. "I just thought you'd want to be in the loop. Anyway, I've got to get back upstairs – I've left Hebby with Jim and Tim, and – well –" he lowers his voice conspiratorially "– I try not to." Already starting to back out, he tilts his head at her and adds, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," Rebecca says, nodding vaguely. "Yeah, I'm fine. You go back. Thanks for letting me know."

Her immediate impulse is to leave AJ to close up, to figure out where Nathaniel is and go straight there, but she squashes it. She and Nathaniel have not been completely out of touch since he left for Guatemala nine months ago, but their contact has been sporadic and careful, each treading lightly around the other's need for space. And anyway, recently she's been learning to temper her bull-in-China-shop attitude to just barrelling into places uninvited, throwing her whirlwind self into people's lives with no warning.

So she finishes her shift, her mind never far from Nathaniel. She lets AJ leave early for his subversive cross stitch class, closes up, does her prep for tomorrow and drives home, fighting the impulse the entire time to just pick up the phone and call him. When she gets home, she drops her keys by the door and heads straight for her bedroom, falls heavily onto her back on the bed and closes her eyes.

She takes her time, does an emotional scan then writes a stream of consciousness in her notebook. It takes the edge off the intensity, removes the all-or-nothing, now-or-never, great-friend-or-worst-person-in-the-world angle from the decision and brings the whole thing back to what it really is: she is considering sending a text to her ex-boyfriend, who she cares about a lot, because his father is dead and she thinks he might need a friend. And because she wants to see him. And it is okay, she decides, to want to see him.

She types and deletes a lot of versions of the message, editing out a lot of over-explaining, excuse-making, terrible attempts at humour, and everything containing the word 'sorry' in any context because it's far too loaded. By the time she hits send, she feels good about her decision. She sits down at her keyboard, flips open her notebook, and then her phone rings and she grabs it.

"Nathaniel," she says, instead of _hello_, and winces, squeezing her eyes shut.

"Rebecca," he replies, a touch of amusement in his voice.

"Yeah, that was weird," she admits, pressing the heel of her hand into her forehead. "Hello. Hi."

He laughs, an intentionally quiet laugh that tells her he is hiding somewhere away from a crowd for this phone call. "Hi. It was really good to hear from you," he says, his voice low and warm. "Thank you."

"Of course," she says. "How – I mean – how is everything? Is that a stupid question? How are you doing?"

She listens to his slow exhale, and the sound cuts straight to her heart. "It's a lot," he admits. "I'm calling you from the bathroom of my parents' – sorry, my mother's house. I've been back for four days and it's been… The opposite of what my life has been for the past nine months. The will is a lot, and the funeral plans. There are lawyers everywhere, and my mother… Well." He clears his throat, and leaves it at that.

Her heart hurts for him, imagining him hiding in a fancy bathroom from a swarm of men just like his father. The last photo she saw of him, he was in the rainforest, offering an apple cube to a capuchin. "If you need anything," she says. "Anything at all, I'm here, okay? If you want to talk, or just hang out with somebody who isn't like, _in _the whole situation…?"

"That actually sounds… Very appealing."

"Whenever you're free," she says.

"I might not be good company."

"Were you ever?"

"Hilarious," he says, but she can hear him smiling. "What are you doing tomorrow evening?"

"I'm meeting you," she says, smiling right back. "At the time and location of your choice."

"Excellent. I'll text you. I guess I'd better get back…"

"Yeah," she says, picking up a pen, clicking it a couple of times. "Take care of yourself, okay? I'll see you tomorrow."

"Wait, Rebecca," he says, quiet hesitation in every syllable. "Thank you, again. It's good to hear your voice."

"You too," she says, dropping her voice to match his volume. Heat coils low in her stomach, and she wraps an arm around herself protectively, her heart rate picking up. "I've missed you. Goodnight, Nathaniel."

* * *

She's feeling unexpectedly nervous when she arrives – it's fancier than anywhere she usually goes, a nice dress and heels kind of place, but also she's not sure what to expect when she sees him. Talking to him on the phone felt warm and familiar, and agreeing to meet him here felt like the most natural thing in the world. He needs someone to see _him_, not his father's son, and she's more than happy to give him that. And okay, it's not just altruism – she has missed him.

In fact, the further from the three dates fiasco she gets, the more she's wanted to reach out to him. She's settled into a comfortable friendship with Josh, navigated some awkward back-and-forth with Greg before her feelings for him eventually died in the water and it stopped being weird, but the warm pulse of longing she feels for Nathaniel has never really wavered. She has worked at making it a background feeling – a thing she knows about herself, to add to her ever growing collection – rather than the all-encompassing forest fire she would've once lit to keep herself warm. But it never goes away.

The truth is she's still a little afraid of herself – of seeing him and undoing everything and having to push him away again, because she knows there would be no coming back. Since Valentine's Day, she has resisted every stupid temptation to chase the high of romantic love and thrown herself wholeheartedly into all the other loves in her life, and with a whole lot of focus and hard work she's finding something in herself she never thought she would: a _self_. And the more she learns, the more she thinks of the Rebecca who was happy with Nathaniel as some frightened, hatchling version of the one she's becoming now, and it gives her hope that maybe the self she's finding – or as Doctor Akopian reminds her when she's struggling, _building_ – is one he could love, and who could finally love him well. She feels for the first time like she's in a position to be a decent friend to him, and she so does not want to be wrong.

She does a breathing exercise on the sidewalk, smooths the deep blue fabric of her dress over her stomach, and steps inside the restaurant.

It's polished and candlelit. Nathaniel is waiting for her at a table set for two in a crisp white shirt rolled up to the elbows, an after work look, with a scruff around his jaw that forcibly reminds her of their first, ill-advised kiss. But he's different than he was then – tanned, for one, with a bare sadness in his expression that the Nathaniel she kissed in the elevator would never have let out in public. Her heart squeezes at the sight of him, and a beat later he looks up and spots her, his face softening into a welcoming smile. She breathes a sigh of relief.

There are no glitter canons. No trill of fairytale music. She is herself, with a fluttering heart and sweaty palms and no pull to fall into fantasy, and when she smiles back at him it feels real and easy.

He pulls her chair out for her then hesitates as their waitress leaves to let them settle, his arms held very still by his sides. She steps into him first, taking the advantage of the extra couple of inches the heels afford her and throwing her arms around his neck. He softens immediately, wrapping his arms right around her back and leaning down, resting his cheek against hers. "Hey," he says.

She closes her eyes, lets herself melt a little into the hug. His cologne is different than she remembers, but the smell of him underneath is the same, and he feels warm and strong as ever under her palms. His hands press into her back, and she wonders what he's noticing about her, what's different and what isn't. "Hi," she replies, after too long. He gives her a parting squeeze then lets go, pushes her seat in for her as she sits, pulling her mind magnetically back to his fancy upbringing, and his father.

"Nathaniel…" she says as he sits down opposite her, and there's nothing to say next.

"It's okay," he says, lifting the bottle of wine that's been waiting on the table for her arrival. He tilts it toward her, a wordless question, and she slides her glass toward him. He pours, and they clink, then sip. He sets his glass down, fidgeting with his thumbs. "Obviously, it's… Complicated. Difficult. But I'm okay."

She nods, not sure how much to believe him, or how much he believes himself. "It's good to see you," she says. "I mean, obviously it's not good you had to come back for this, but it's -" She sighs. "You know what I mean."

"I do," he says, smiling. "It's good to see you too. How have you been?"

"Busy," she says honestly. "I have Rebetzels, volunteering at the jail, group therapy, regular therapy, therapy homework, voice lessons, piano lessons, notebooks filled with stuff that used to only be inside my brain, a surprising number of friends -"

"I'm not sure I'd call it surprising," he interjects, and she laughs. "That's good, Rebecca. I'm happy for you."

"And you?" she asks. "I mean, before this week, which I assume has been all kinds of terrible. How's Guatemala?"

He opens his mouth to respond, then their waitress starts noticeably hovering, so they take a minute to look at the menu, and after ordering he answers immediately, "Guatemala has been great. It's really the first time in my life I've done something I love just because I love it, and actually doing something meaningful – I needed that. And I needed some distance, I think. Not from you," he adds quickly. "I mean, maybe also from you, but I meant…" He frowns.

"The Plimpton establishment?" she suggests, so he doesn't have to say _my father_, and he tips his head in acknowledgement.

"He left me the firm," he says, and there's something in his voice that takes her by surprise.

"You weren't expecting him to? Wasn't that always…" She cringes, already regretting the question. "… The plan?"

"Wasn't that the entire point of my existence up to this point, you mean?" he asks, an eyebrow quirking up. She opens her mouth to backpedal, and he waves it away. "Yes, it was," he says. "It was, for a long time. That was always the understanding in the family and in the firm. But… Really our paths diverged a while ago, quite a bit before I left for Guatemala. I was… Under the impression…" He shakes his head, exhaling forcefully. "I'm sorry," he says. "I've been using my lawyer voice to talk about my father since I got back. I don't know why I'm using it on you. Honestly, I haven't had a real conversation with anybody in English for months."

"Hey," she says, shrugging. "Whatever voice you need to use to say the stuff you need to say, I support it. This is like, the definition of a tough time. It's okay."

"Thank you," he says, to his folded hands on the table. He glances up at her, not quite meeting her eyes, and smiles tightly. "It's been a strange few days."

"Yeah," she says softly. "Nathaniel, if you're not up to sitting in a restaurant right now, we can go. I would've just asked you to come over, but I thought…"

"Neutral territory?" he suggests.

"Something like that," she agrees, chewing her lip.

"It's okay," he says. "I'm okay here. Thank you."

"Okay," Rebecca says, aiming for an encouraging smile. He reciprocates, his smile sad but real, and it settles warm in her chest. "So. Your dad left you the firm."

"Right," he says, rubbing a hand over his face. She follows the movement, cataloguing it – it's a surprisingly private-Nathaniel gesture for such a public place. "And I have no idea what I'm going to do."

She blows out a breath. "Well, what options do you have on the table?"

"The first option is the one everyone is expecting me to take," he says, picking up his wine glass and taking a sip, then frowning into it. "They're talking about it like it's a done deal, actually. Like there's no question."

"Move to LA and run the firm," she guesses, secondhand dread dropping heavy and cold in her stomach.

"Yeah." He swirls his wine, staring down into it, and when he looks up, he's holding his jaw tense, a shine in his eyes she's sure wasn't there before. "Or I stay in but step back, appoint a managing partner to run things day to day."

"Or you sell," she says quietly.

"Or I sell," he agrees, and sighs. "You can imagine how that would go down, of course."

If she's honest with herself, she can't. She always thought she had a handle on Nathaniel's issues with his father. If not a full picture then at least a working understanding: enough to press his buttons when she wanted to, and eventually enough to know what was too close to a nerve to touch. She knew when to pretend beyond all plausibility she couldn't hear his phone conversations, when to find an excuse to actually leave the room to spare his pride. She could tell from what he ate for lunch and the tension in his muscles as he ate it how close he was to meeting his father's latest arbitrary target. But in all the time she knew him, she never really considered Nathaniel being the heir to his father's firm in a meaningful way – maybe the old man never seemed human enough to die. Or maybe Nathaniel seemed too human to take over from him. And of course, she has never had to consider what she would do if _her_ terrible father died and left her an outrageously valuable law firm she didn't want, because _her _terrible father asks her for money for his other kid's braces.

Instead of saying any of that, she spreads her palm flat in the middle of the table – she does it to catch his attention, because she can see him starting to retreat into his head, unfocused and frowning, and she really is not expecting it when he lays his hand over hers. The surprise must register on her face – he clears his throat, starts to pull his hand back toward him, and she catches it and holds it. "Hey," she says as the warmth of him radiates into her palm. "We only get one life, right?"

He chews his lip, says nothing but gives her hand an almost imperceptible squeeze.

"You want to know my advice?"

"You're asking?" he says, his mouth quirking into a smile.

She laughs, batting him. "Shut up, I'm evolving."

"Ah." Amused, he lays his other hand over hers, brushing a thumb over her fingers. "Yes, I think I would like to hear your advice."

"Okay. My advice is that you don't have to make this decision right now. Put somebody in charge short term, get the immediate mess out of the way and give yourself time to think." She tilts her head, gives him a smile. "Go back to your monkeys, Nathaniel."

"That is… Surprisingly level headed of you," Nathaniel says, eyebrows raised. "Not a hint of a hair brained scheme in sight."

"What are you suggesting, Plimpton?"

"I guess I'm suggesting that I've missed you."

The waitress arrives with their food then, because of course. They obediently sit up straight, taking their arms off the table and sitting in silence as she sets everything down, straightens their cutlery, refills their wine glasses, tells them to enjoy their meal, and walks off, painfully slowly. Rebecca stares after her, idly wondering whether she can turn the inevitable awkwardness of having a heartfelt conversation in a restaurant into lyrics. In the time he went without a response, Nathaniel has retreated inward, just holding the stem of his wine glass between his fingertips, staring at it intently and twisting it very slightly back and forth.

Rebecca slides her foot forward and nudges his ankle – just a quick tap to get his attention. "Hey," she says, and when he looks at her he is so closed off it breaks her heart a little. "Not to hit on you in your time of distress or anything," she begins softly, and some of the tension leaves his shoulders, "but I have missed you too. And I'm glad to be here with you, eating this poorly timed, outrageously expensive salad in these terrible circumstances. And if after dinner you wanted to go somewhere else together, I would not be opposed. But if you would prefer to not open this admittedly very loaded can of worms right now, I would also support that decision. I just want to be here for you, however you need me to be, because you're really important to me."

He lets out a long breath, his eyes finding their way to hers. "Rebecca," he says, choked.

"I know that's a lot," she says quickly. "I just… I didn't want you to be wondering anymore, I guess? I mean, I'm not saying you were, but I know that in the past…" She screws her eyes shut, takes a breath. "Shut up, Rebecca."

When she looks back at him, he's staring at her, his expression unreadable. "I'm glad to be here with you too," he says after a moment, catching her foot between his.

* * *

Nathaniel, it turns out, has been working pretty much every waking hour, around a third of his time spent actually lawyering and the rest of it hands on helping out at the sanctuary. The image of him bottle feeding orphaned monkeys hasn't stopped being surreal to her, but he sounds alive when he talks about it. He's been helping some staff and volunteers learn English, but otherwise speaking only in Spanish – he tries this on her, and she discovers she is much rustier than she thought and taps out after a few stilted sentences. He's made time to read a lot of books, and discovered poetry has value beyond passing mandatory college courses. When he talks about anything apart from his father and the firm, he sounds happier than she's ever heard him.

Rebecca fills him in on her life too – he's curious about songwriting, and at his hopeful smile she agrees to play him one of her songs on keyboard at some point. The lyrics aren't done, she warns him, and she's not brave enough to sing in front of him yet. (He generously doesn't point out that she sang more or less constantly the entire time they shared an office, or that they were literally in a musical together.) She tells him about the cases she and Paula are working on at the jail, the trip she and Heather took to New York to see Valencia and Beth and a cute off-Broadway musical, and the week she spent right after it up until ridiculous hours feverishly writing musical theatre style songs. She tries to explain the thrill of sitting in a room with any combination of her girls, writing stuff she didn't ever think she could share while they cheer her on. She tells him she feels like she's starting to know herself, and his face lights up like she's shown him magic is real.

He waves away her half-hearted attempt at paying half for the meal, and then they're outside, standing under a streetlamp. She decisively inputs her own address when she orders the Uber. She tucks herself into his side while they wait, and he wraps an arm around her and pulls her close. She nestles against his chest, his heartbeat strong and steady under her ear. Something in the back of her mind is yelling at her that she's broken and stupid and crazy and is definitely going to screw this up, and something like panic starts to flutter in her throat, but if she really concentrates, she can see it for what it is. _Up yours, Tyler_.

"Huh?" Nathaniel says, balancing his chin on the top of her head.

"Oh, I meant to only say that on the inside," she replies. "I'll tell you about Tyler some time – he isn't a real person – it's a whole thing."

"Hey," he says, his voice quiet. "If this is too much, I really don't mind going back to the hotel -"

"No! God, no, please don't. Just… Maybe tonight we shouldn't…?" she begins, her body already protesting against the suggestion – she tingles everywhere her body is in contact with his, heat radiating out from his hands on her back, warming every nerve and pooling between her thighs. It's the healthy thing to do, she knows, especially when all the worst parts of her brain start screaming at her to take it back.

"Okay," he says, without hesitation.

She takes half a step back to look up at him, resting her hands on his chest, looking for disappointment or confusion or hurt or anything that looks remotely like rejection. Instead, he gives her a soft smile, combs his fingers through her hair and tucks a strand behind her ear. His fingertips trail feather-light down her neck, sending a thrill up her spine, his eyes on hers. It feels safe in all the ways she was afraid it would feel dangerous. "But if you wanted to kiss me…" she begins, her eyes already drifting shut.

His lips are on hers a moment later, one hand cupping the back of her neck and the other spread across her back – she slides a hand up around his neck and holds him close. It's soft and gentle and makes her ache in the best possible way.

* * *

She borrows some sweatpants and a t-shirt for Nathaniel from AJ, brings them to him as he sits on the edge of her bed checking the calendar on his phone. "In the interests of our self-control, I thought you might want to sleep in these," she suggests, sitting down beside him. "AJ says if we have sex after you put them on, I owe him a whole new wardrobe, so…"

"_I_ owe him, surely," he says, frowning at his phone then looking up to take the clothes from her with a smile. "Thank you."

"Everything okay?" she asks.

"Yeah, fine," he says on an exhale. He gets up, drops his phone on the bedside table, starts unbuttoning his shirt then freezes. "I'm sorry, did you want me to change in the bathroom or -?"

"No, no no," she says quickly. "I'm not trying to avoid intimacy or anything, I just… I want to be sure I'm breaking the pattern. I haven't always made the most… _Reasoned_ decisions, where sex is involved."

He laughs, a strangled, half amused sound that says _you don't say_, and she throws the t-shirt at him, pulling a face. He catches it deftly, unbuttons his shirt and pulls the t-shirt over his head with no ceremony, and she makes her very best effort (which is to say a very poor effort) at not staring too much at him for the moments he's shirtless. "Subtle," he says, smirking at her, and sits on the edge of the bed to kick off his shoes and change into the sweatpants.

"You know me," she trills, shameless, then turns her back on him. "Unzip me?"

He laughs, and stands, resting his hands on her shoulders for a second. It somehow steadies her and undoes her at the exact same time – she feels like a liquid pooling at his feet, and when he pulls the zipper of her dress down the length of her back she actually shivers. She steps out of the dress, unhooks her bra and pulls on her sushi PJs without making eye contact with him. "There," she breathes, sitting down on the bed. "How mature of us."

"Very," Nathaniel agrees. He sits up against the headboard and drops his head back, clearly exhausted. She sits facing him, legs crossed in front of her.

"You want to get some sleep?" she asks. "Do you have an early start?"

"I have an earlyish start." He sighs heavily and she shuffles closer so her knee rests on his thigh. He drapes a hand over it, makes circles on her thigh with his fingertips. "Which I am dreading, honestly. This whole thing is like one big miserable business deal." Surprisingly vulnerable, he glances up at her face then back down at his hand on her leg. "This isn't what death is like in other people's families, is it?"

She winces. "I think this is a Plimpton special."

He closes his eyes, rubs at his forehead. "I've had a really good time with you," he says softly. "Ever since I got back, everything around me has been trying to turn me back into this corporate monster, until tonight. And I'm not ready for it to end."

"This doesn't have to be an ending," she says gently, and he squeezes her thigh. It sends tingles shooting through her in every direction, her body ridiculously tuned into his. _Get it together, Bunch_. "Get some sleep, Nathaniel. And do whatever you need to do to get through whatever hell the Plimpton estate has in store for you tomorrow, and come back here and _be a person_. Rinse, repeat, Guatemala."

"You really think I should go back?"

There's something guarded in his voice, and she thinks she hears the part he doesn't say: _do you really want me to go back?_

She tilts her head, catches his gaze and holds it, brings a hand up to brush the scruff of his jaw. "You are doing something for yourself for the first time in your whole life," she says. "Something you _love_. And – wait, it's fine to speak ill of the dead right now, right? Just a little ill?" He raises his eyebrows but doesn't object, so she ploughs on. "Your father has controlled enough of your life already. He doesn't get to just die and drag you to corporate hell with him. You don't owe his memory a damn thing."

Part of her expects him to bristle at that – she braces for at least a flare of anger – but he doesn't. He just closes his eyes and rests his head back against the wall, and she drops her hand down to squeeze his. "Come on," she whispers. "You need to sleep."

She gets up to switch off the light, and they climb under the covers together. Predictably, the combination of the darkened room and horizontal position heighten everything. Her body comes alive with electricity, goosebumps everywhere, and he seems so sad and exhausted and she wants to make him happy, and she is so, so tempted to throw her own rule out of the window. Every nerve in her body wants to climb on top of him right now. But she's all too aware that throwing rules out of windows every time temptation rolls in is how she gets herself in trouble, so she grits her teeth and squeezes her thighs together and fits herself against Nathaniel's side, a hand splayed on his chest, rising and falling with each breath.

"You know I didn't come out tonight expecting this," he says, his voice low and uncertain in the still air. "Or hoping for it, even."

"Yeah, I know," she says, nuzzling into him. "It's okay though, right?"

"It's so much more than okay. I just need you to know that I haven't been… Waiting. This isn't a pounce-when-the-opportunity-arises thing."

"I know."

"Good."

He shifts onto his side and pulls her against him – she nestles under his chin, burrowing into the fabric of the borrowed t-shirt, breathing him in. "Hey, Nathaniel?"

"Mm?"

"I'm really sorry about your dad. In whatever way it makes sense to be sorry." She feels the catch in his breath, his arms tightening around her. "And in case it wasn't clear," she adds, "whatever comes next… I'm here, okay? I want to be right here." He presses a kiss to the top of her head, sending a tingle from her scalp to her toes. The glitter doesn't consume her, and neither does the darkness, and this feeling becomes a new thing she knows about herself.


	2. Chapter 2

The next day, she drops Nathaniel at his hotel in the morning. She goes to therapy, and tells Dr Akopian the truth: she is still afraid, but this feels different, and it feels right and warm and safe, and she wants to do the work to keep it that way. She gets her homework – a diary of her emotions, triggers and responses – and she feels hopeful. If she's not mistaken, Dr Akopian seems hopeful too.

She calls Nathaniel on her lunch break and offers to pick him up when he's free for the evening. "I'll be at my mother's house, with my father's lawyers," he says, like it's a warning. "My afternoon is finishing up funeral plans."

"Even more reason for a getaway vehicle, no?"

"It does hold a certain appeal when you put it that way," he says, sounding utterly exhausted already. "If you're sure… I'll see you at five thirty?"

"You got it. Hang in there, Nathaniel."

* * *

She really shouldn't be surprised, she thinks, as she gets nearer the address Nathaniel texted her. This neighbourhood is everything she should've expected, ridiculously fancy houses on ridiculously large plots of land, all secure gates and fancy cars. The Plimpton house is exactly as imposing as she would've imagined when she first met Nathaniel, but at some point the thought of him in a place like this has become incongruous.

She navigates the security situation, parks her car, and a small middle aged lady in a cardigan meets her at the front door, opening it before she can touch the doorbell. "Good evening," she says, and just as Rebecca opens her mouth to reply, Nathaniel appears from a doorway. "Thank you, Bernice," he says. "Rebecca's with me." Bernice nods at him, pulls the front door shut and disappears upstairs.

For a precious moment, they're alone in the hallway, and Nathaniel's hand finds Rebecca's waist. He's visibly agitated, his jaw held tense, breathing like he's been running. "Hey," she says softly, a hand on his arm. "Are you okay?"

"I -" he begins, then there's the click of heels on floorboards and he turns. "Mother," he says, as another woman walks down the hall toward them. Rebecca could never really see Nathaniel in his father, but as his mother comes nearer, she thinks she gets the resemblance. She's oddly formal, all pearls and long lines and elegant bone structure, her eyes pale blue and deeply sad. "Mother, this is my friend Rebecca," he says.

Rebecca holds out her hand, and Mrs Plimpton grasps it. "It's lovely to meet you," she says, then Nathaniel's hand is firm on her waist again, edging them closer to the door, very clearly trying to make an exit, but there's someone else striding down the hall, an older man in a pinstriped suit.

"Nathaniel!" he says, his voice inappropriately loud in what is so clearly a tense atmosphere, and Rebecca flinches. "Glad I caught you. We just have a couple more things we need you to look over before you leave for the evening. Couple of signatures we need, you know."

"Can it wait until tomorrow?" Nathaniel says tersely. Rebecca rests a hand above his elbow, squeezing gently, feeling totally helpless. She can feel the panic coming off him in waves.

The man looks affronted, his expression strikingly similar to one she has seen on Nathaniel's father, and Nathaniel relents immediately. "We need to make it quick," he says. He turns apologetically to Rebecca. "I'll be right back."

"It's okay, Nathaniel," she says. "Honestly, take your time, I'm okay."

He looks at her for a long moment, looking like the last thing he wants to do in the world is walk away, but the guy in the suit clears his throat and Nathaniel grits his teeth, gathers his composure, and follows him into a room down the hall. Mrs Plimpton gestures for Rebecca to follow her, so she does, into a sitting room so dark and overbearing and packed with clearly expensive objects her eyes don't know where to go. She feels like she's walked into a wall of rose scent, and it becomes immediately clear why. Almost every surface is covered with vases of them, deep red and picture perfect, if a little unsettling in sheer number. "These are beautiful," she says quietly, feeling extremely out of place in her post-Rebetzels outfit of dark wash jeans and emerald blouse.

"Oh, thank you, dear," Mrs Plimpton says with a courteous smile and an unnerving, distant quality to her voice, leading the way to the sofa and sitting. "We have a gardener, but I tend to the roses myself."

Rebecca sits too, perched on the edge of the sofa with her knees pushed together, looking around the room because she can't quite bring herself to look at Nathaniel's mother. There's so much dark pattern in here, so much stuff, and _so many roses_. Two thoughts slam into her simultaneously: she's sitting in the consequences of someone else's obsessive spiral, and she can't imagine a child growing up in this house. "Nathaniel brought me some of these once," she says, making the connection suddenly, touching the nearest rose gently with her fingertips. "When I… I was sick. They're really lovely."

Mrs Plimpton turns, eyes fixed on Rebecca's face, presumably making a connection of her own. "Yes, Nathaniel mentioned you to me," she says. With unexpected intensity, she leans forward and says in a hushed voice, "Are you feeling better now?"

"Yeah," Rebecca says, holding herself very still. The combination of the room and the roses and the intense, unspoken sadness of the woman in front of her is activating her fight-or-flight, blood pounding in her ears, and it's all she can do to keep herself on the seat. She knows her oversharing can be a lot, but this next-level repression is suffocating, and she's only been here two minutes. "I have a good doctor," she says carefully, her throat feeling suddenly dry. "And good medicine. I'm doing much better."

Mrs Plimpton stares at her a few seconds longer, then nods and sits further back on the sofa. "That's good," she says, very quietly. "That's very good to hear. I've wondered about you."

"I…" Rebecca begins, with no real idea what she's going to say next. It feels like she's supposed to give a pep talk, supposed to say that anti-depressants aren't a big deal, or that if you haven't found a therapist who works for you, you can look for a better fit, or that it's okay to have no idea how you feel about anything. But it couldn't be clearer that this is not a woman who talks about her mental health, and she doesn't want to make life any more difficult for Nathaniel. Before she can choose one of the probably wildly inappropriate things she's thinking about saying, the door opens, and Nathaniel is standing in the doorway, looking tense and rattled and like he needs to get the hell out of here. She stands, already heading for the door, magnetically pulled to his side. "Thank you, Mrs Plimpton," she says. "I'm glad to meet you, and I – I'm sorry about your husband."

"Thank you, dear," she says, still quiet and distant, picking up a rose and a set of pruning scissors from the coffee table. She glances up. "Goodbye, Nathaniel."

"Goodbye, mother," he says, and starts to leave. He turns back in the doorway, hesitant, and Rebecca has never seen him look so small. "Mom. If you need me…" he says, his hands balling to nervous fists.

She smiles at him but says nothing, and Rebecca slips her hand into his and squeezes. He squeezes back and doesn't stop – he leads her from the room, gripping her hand hard as he strides down the hall, outside, down the steps, down the drive and up to her car, Rebecca half running at his side to keep up. "Wow," she breathes, getting into the driver's seat, flexing her tingling fingers as the blood rushes back to them.

"Yeah," he says, dropping in beside her, his voice sounding like it takes real effort. He grabs the knot of his tie and pulls it loose, undoing his top button and closing his eyes. "I just… Really need to get out of here."

"Commence getaway, copy that."

She drives, and he sits with his hand over his eyes, his breathing jagged and laboured, his body held tense. Her own racing heart clenches in sympathy – as soon as they're out of the immediate neighbourhood, she glances sideways at him, takes his free hand and places it on his stomach. "Breathe from here," she says, eyes back on the road. "Out first. And let me know if you need me to pull over."

She waits, taking deep breaths of her own, her heart slowing until she's no longer aware of it, then she looks back over at him. He's still sitting with his hand over his closed eyes, chewing his lip, but his chest is rising and falling at a reasonable rate. She rests a hand on his thigh, and he takes it, brushes his thumb over her knuckles.

"I don't know what that was," he says a little awkwardly, after a couple more silent minutes. "But I'm sorry."

"That, my friend, was an anxiety attack," Rebecca replies. "And you have nothing to be sorry for. Your first?"

"Uh, no, I guess not," he admits. "But it's been a while. And I don't think I've ever done it in front of people before, or… Given it a name."

"Well, I'm not people," she says. "And anxiety and I are well acquainted, as you're probably aware."

"I kind of crushed your hand."

"Seriously, don't worry about it. I'm much tougher than I look." She holds her hand up in front of his face, wiggles her fingers. "See? Good as new."

He kisses her fingers one by one, his lips just grazing her knuckles, and goosebumps tingle up her arm. "Thank you," he says, quiet and soft.

"Any time. Really."

* * *

Back at her apartment, she does her therapy homework at the kitchen table while Nathaniel makes dinner. She writes that she felt _anxious_ and _helpless_ and _in control_ and _proud_, starting out a confused jumble then writing her way to some kind of acceptance of the ambiguity and contradictions. _Being human is confusing_, she concludes. She's lost count of how many times she has written that sentence. She closes her notebook and sits with her chin in her hands for a while, watching him busying around the kitchen, barefoot and pleasantly domestic in his own sweatpants and t-shirt, cooking stir fry. This looks so much more like his natural habitat than his mother's weirdly oppressive sitting room, and it fills her mind with a thousand questions – some past version of herself would be probing for every detail, and the temptation is definitely there, but she sees the insecurity in that now, in trying to find a way to break in instead of just walking through the open door.

But if she's going to avoid falling into obsessive behaviour, she probably shouldn't just be silently watching him cook, so she gets up, crosses the room and rests a hand between his shoulder blades as he scoops some stir fry into a couple of bowls. He wipes his hands on a dish towel and turns, reaches down around her waist, tightening his arms around her, and she gets his intention just in time to loop her arms around his neck – he boosts her up onto the counter, and she wraps her legs around him and pulls him in close. Her hands come to rest at the back of his head, where his hair is short and makes her palms tingle, and they kiss long and slow and a little breathless, his lips firm and insistent on hers, fingertips digging into her hips, and she is certain she knows the temptation he's fighting because she's right there with him, her body alive with want, humming with electricity.

This is the part that always came easily to them, the part they spent eight months using as shorthand for feelings they couldn't express any other way without blowing their world apart.

They break apart, both breathing hard, and he drops his head to her shoulder and wraps his arms around her, holding on like he's afraid she might slip away. She holds him between her knees, makes soothing circles on the tense muscles of his back, tuned into the steady rise and fall of his breaths. "You know, that house would get to anyone," she says.

His arms tighten around her for a moment, then he pulls back, dropping his hands to her hips again. He chews at the corner of his mouth, and all awkward hesitation, he says, "I don't know how to talk about any of this yet. I want to, I do, but I -" he swallows the end of the sentence, resets, and adds, "I also don't know if I can eat right now, and I need you to not make a big deal out of it."

"Nathaniel, of course," she says, breathless. She can feel the warmth she feels for him all over her face. He smiles back, his hands squeezing her hips. "It's okay to just be a mess right now," she says, sliding off the counter and hugging him around his waist. Then, because there's nothing else to say, "You want to watch a movie?"

She carries their bowls over to the sofa, sits them on the coffee table and gets them a couple of glasses of water while Nathaniel scrolls through her Netflix looking for something to watch. She puts the glasses down on the table too, sits down beside him. "You're in the romcom section," she states, looking at the screen with raised eyebrows.

"So?" he says, defiant.

She grins. "You're so full of surprises."

"Whereas you are always entirely predictable."

"I maintain you should've expected to be stabbed in the neck with a pen that day."

He looks at her sideways, smiling, and she feels shy suddenly. Their history stretches out infinitely in the tiny space between them. She meant it when she told him some of the happiest times in her life had been with him. She had never doubted how he felt about her – run from it, yeah, but never doubted it, not even with the echo of his rejection of monogamy always ticking over in the back of her mind, filling her with excuses. She knew the moment he stopped believing it, and it scared the shit out of her. She'd used him when she felt used; she'd been shattered and torn him open to see his broken pieces. She had seen love in his eyes like she'd never seen it anywhere else, and in her darkest moments she'd hated him for it, for showing her this was a thing she could have if she wasn't such an unworthy, irredeemable mess. She catches that thought, the way it makes her heart hammer in her throat, and she forces herself to watch it retreat. "It was bad timing," she says, and she doesn't remember actually deciding to say it out loud but there it is in the air between them.

"Stabbing me with a pen?" he says, turning a little to face her, eyebrows raised. "How would you have timed it, given the choice?"

"Not _that_," she says, rolling her eyes. She chews her lip, looking at him uncertainly. "Us. Every time. Bad timing."

"Ah," he says, reaching up to tuck her hair behind her ear. It's so familiar and so _him _it makes her feel warm from head to toe, and she leans into his hand – he threads his fingers into her hair and her eyes fall shut. "And now?" he says, hesitant, his thumb stroking her scalp.

"It should be wrong," she says quietly, forcing her eyes open to meet his. "Shouldn't it? Your dad, and Guatemala…"

"That's irrelevant," he says simply. "The timing was never wrong…" He pauses, considering. "Externally."

She laughs in spite of herself. "Did you just 'it's not me it's you' me?"

"No, I -"

"I know what you mean," she says quickly, wrapping a hand around his forearm and squeezing. "You're right. It was me."

"And me," he reminds her gently. "When you were trying to come down to earth and live in reality and I was trying to pack you onto a private jet to Hawaii, for example."

She feels her head tilt to the side as his words sink in. "Huh," she says, processing. "You're right. I don't think I ever realised what I hated about that idea."

"Neither did I, for too long," he admits. "Talking to monkeys has a lot of midnight epiphanies to answer for."

She grins. "We're a real mess."

"We certainly have been," he allows, half smiling.

"I'm still a mess," she says quietly. She's never sure how to handle this, the fact that even at her best she should definitely come with a warning label. Putting her mugshot on her dating profile definitely wasn't it. "I know I'm more – settled. More level. But I'm still me. I'm never going to be…" She squeezes her eyes shut before even saying it, because it still hurts, because she still wants it, even though everyone keeps telling her it isn't a real thing. "… Normal."

"Rebecca," he says, reaching for her with both hands. He pulls her into a hug and she goes willingly, curling against his side. "I don't need you to be normal. I just need you to be honest. To not to run from me if it gets difficult."

She closes her eyes, sees the darkness on the horizon, imagines how little effort it would take to run headlong into it. She toys with the soft fabric of his t-shirt, absorbing the warmth of him underneath, syncing her breaths with the steady rise and fall of his chest under her hand. He feels solid and real, and with a wave of happiness she realises that she does too. "I can do that," she says, and believes it.

His arms tighten around her, grounding reassurance. "You can," he says, his voice low. "And what about you? What do you need from me?"

She takes a moment, really thinks about it, and can only think of one word. "Reality."

He kisses the top of her head. "I can do that," he says into her hair.

She takes a breath, releases it all in a rush. "Well, that got super intense."

"Yeah. You okay?"

She retrieves the TV remote from under her leg and hands it to him. "I'm okay," she confirms. "Romcom time?"

He chooses one apparently at random, and she shifts a little to see the screen without breaking contact, holding the hand he has draped over her shoulder. It's truly terrible, every cliché in the book, and she marvels at how transparently stupid it is that she ever thought her life should look like this. After a while she remembers she's hungry, sits up straight and grabs her bowl from the table. Nathaniel tenses momentarily. She crosses her legs, letting her knee fall onto his thigh, and he rests a hand there and relaxes again. The food is cold by now, but it doesn't matter much – it's gingery and spicy and delicious. The movie's entire ensemble cast find themselves in a bar on karaoke night, and Nathaniel says, "Oh my god."

"What?" she says, through a mouthful of noodles.

"It's a gratuitous karaoke moment," he replies, sounding equally horrified and transfixed.

"Oh you're a real connoisseur, aren't you?"

"Shh, you don't want to miss this."

He's right. It's awful, and also great. The characters start out sounding like her at her worst, and end up sounding like her singing teacher at her best, in the space of three minutes. She glances at Nathaniel and he's grinning. He catches her eye, takes a slice of bell pepper from her bowl and eats it. She grabs his fork from the table and offers it to him, eyes on the screen. He takes it, she settles back against him and they share the rest of her dinner.

* * *

After the movie, she stretches out on the sofa, her feet in his lap. "So I should probably apologise," he says, resting his hands over her ankles, "for leaving you alone with my mother with no warning. It was… Not my intention."

"Nathaniel, it's really okay. Navigating awkward Plimpton house interactions is part of what being here for you looks like, and I'm fine with it. And she was fine – just wait until you get left alone in a room with my mother."

He gives her a tiny smile, but it fades almost immediately. "She's…" He wraps a hand around her ankle and she stretches out her toes. "She's intense right now," he says eventually. "Especially right now, I mean. And uh…"

She waits, but he doesn't say anything else, just stares down at her feet in his lap.

"It seems like there's something you're not saying," she prompts. She gives him another minute, then just goes for it. "And if it's that she knows about my suicide attempt, I know."

His whole body jolts a little, his eyes slamming shut, and she winces. "I'm sorry," she says quickly. She pulls her feet away and sits up, facing him. "I just – I thought that might be the thing you weren't saying because it's an awkward thing to say, and I'm very practiced at saying awkward things like they're casual conversation, so…"

He smiles reluctantly. "Don't be sorry, Rebecca," he says. "You're right. That's what I was thinking about. It's – I know it isn't my story to tell. I don't want you to think I just…" He trails off helplessly, fidgeting with his thumbs.

"It doesn't seem like you and your mother have a gossiping relationship, honestly," she says. He meets her eyes for a second then looks away. "Hey," she says, tilting her head, trying to catch his attention. "Whatever it is, it's okay. It's okay that you told her – it isn't a big secret or anything. It's just a thing that happened."

He swallows, hard. "She did the same thing," he says, his voice quiet and controlled, his body held very still. She finds herself going still too, his careful tone pinning her to the sofa. "When I was ten, in our house. I found her, and then my father made me leave, and she was gone for a month, and we never talked about it. Until you."

On the last word, he looks back at her, his eyes shining, and there have already been too many _sorry_s for another one to mean anything, so she just breathes, "Shit, Nathaniel."

It breaks the hush, at least – he exhales on a laugh, dropping his chin to his chest. "Yeah," he says. He looks away, swipes at his cheek with the back of his hand, and she pretends not to notice. He looks back at her, so much unexpected warmth mixed into the sadness on his face it takes her by surprise. She just stares back at him, processing, feeling a hundred different things at once, none of them fully forming as thoughts. He seems to get it – she has rarely felt an emotion without it being all over her face. He leans in, gives her a quick kiss, then gets up and disappears into the bathroom.

She stares after him for a few seconds, letting the information sink in, her mind whirling with it, trying to make sense of him in this new context. But she isn't getting anywhere – wave after wave of messy, complicated emotion crashes over her, and she can't grab onto any one of them, can't think of a single thing to say that means anything at all.

Instead, she goes to her keyboard and sits, takes a steadying breath and plays a couple of warm up scales to unfreeze her fingers. Then she starts on the closest thing she has to a finished song. She plays it through once, settling into the familiar notes – she still has to concentrate hard on making her fingers behave as they're supposed to, but this one song she knows well enough that it has started to feel like home. She finishes, glances up at the closed bathroom door, then starts again, this time humming the melody. The door opens a couple of lines in and he stands there, leaning against the frame – she isn't quite bold enough to look up at him, but she starts to add lyrics where she has them.

It feels different than singing in front of him ever has before – not a show tune, not a silly taunt, not the pi song. Something that's only hers, from inside her brain, that exists because of her. It feels vulnerable and scary, like telling a secret.

Her fingers fall still and then he's taking her hand, tugging her to her feet, tilting her chin up so their eyes meet. "You are incredible," he says, like it's the most obvious thing in the world, and with tears stinging at her eyes and a desperate little sobbing sound she didn't mean to make, she grabs his neck and pulls him down to her. They melt together, lips crashing together, breathing each other in, and his hands are everywhere, sliding up her back under her shirt, into her hair, and when they stumble together through her bedroom door she has never been more certain of anything.


	3. Chapter 3

_Heads up: they get naked. This chapter contains explicit sexual content._

* * *

They crash toward her bed, her hands grabbing fistfuls of his t-shirt as they kiss, and she pushes him backwards until he drops onto the bed and she comes down almost on top of him, a leg thrown over his. Her body has not forgotten any of this, already humming with desperate energy everywhere his hands land. Rocking into the firm muscle of his thigh, she leans into him, kisses along his rough jaw, tasting his skin, a hand curled tight around the back of his neck.

Then he catches her upper arm, wrapping a hand around her bicep and pushing her back a little. "Wait," he breathes, and a whine escapes her as his mouth breaks contact with hers. His eyes meet hers, searching. "Are you sure about this? You said -"

"That was yesterday," she says, dropping her face back to his, catching his mouth with hers.

He melts back into the kiss, a hand sliding between her shoulder blades, teeth raking across her lower lip, but breaks free and pushes back again, pushing himself up on his elbows, his pupils blown but eyebrows knit with concern. "Rebecca. Why? This isn't pity sex, is it?"

His face is an inch from hers, his laboured breath hot as it lands on her lips, and the intensity of his gaze sends a shiver up her spine. Despite the impatience fizzing in her veins, her heart races with affection for him. "It is not pity sex," she says, her voice quiet and hoarse, eyes on his, willing him to get it, to be on board, because she is sure she's never wanted anything – anyone – so completely. "Yesterday I was afraid I wasn't strong enough for this yet. I was afraid we didn't know how else to communicate."

He moans low in his throat, winds a hand back into her hair and pushes her onto her back, rolling on top of her – she arches up into him, hands around his back, wriggling so his thigh is between her legs again as he drops his mouth to her neck, kissing insistently under her ear, setting her whole body alight and drawing a low whine out of her that should probably be embarrassing but isn't. She feels him smile against her neck, his free hand sliding up under her t-shirt, his fingertips grazing the underside of her breast, and she pulls him closer, pressing his thigh into her, her breaths already coming in desperate gasps.

"It's been a while," she murmurs, writhing against him, searching for the right friction. "So, disclaimer. I might be – rusty, or – _ah_ – or ridiculously turned on, like, immediately."

He laughs into her neck, slides a thumb over her nipple and breathes, "Glad we're on the same page." His voice is low and warm, his lips against her neck and his nose just nudging her earlobe, and he presses himself against her thigh to demonstrate, and _god_ he is so ready for this.

"Nathaniel," she breathes, sliding a hand down to touch him through the front of his sweatpants – he pushes against her, apparently involuntarily, with a strangled groan that shoots right through her. "Nathaniel, just – take your damn clothes off."

"Jesus," he mutters, pushing himself off the bed. She kneels, struggling out of her clothes and watching him hungrily as he pulls the t-shirt over his head, shoves his sweatpants and underwear down and steps out of them, and then just stands perfectly still and stares at her, his lips parted slightly, taking her in. His eyes are dark and wanting as they take in the length of her body before coming back to meet hers.

Hot under his gaze and suddenly inspired, she slides to the edge of the bed, holds his hips and pulls him closer. She presses her lips against his stomach, and his hand is in her hair again, his touch gentle and reverent and a little uncertain as she kisses lower and lower. She draws a line with her nose back up to look at him through her lashes. "Can I?" she whispers. She feels him shiver. His mouth opens a little, closes, then he tightens his grip on her head and urges her down – her arousal spiking ridiculously, she leans down and takes him into her mouth, deep and slow.

"_Fuck_," he breathes, his muscles jumping under her hands as she repeats the movement. Swirling her tongue around his tip, she glances up at him, and _fuck is right_, she thinks, taking him fully back into her mouth, because he looks completely obliterated, his eyes slammed shut and head dropped back, his breathing laboured. She takes his free hand and places it under her chin, and this time when she looks back up at him his eyes lock with hers. He runs his thumb over her cheek, tentatively pulling out of her mouth then pushing back in, gentle and careful, the pads of his fingers soft on her jaw, his eyes wide and expressive in a way that would've ruined everything in the days of the affair. She breathes through the thought – they're not there anymore, they're here, and it's safe and real, and she locks her lips around him and sucks, letting her eyes fall shut, squeezing her thighs together and sending a shiver up her spine. The pulsing pressure between her legs is just about unbearable now – she wedges her hand between her thighs and rocks against it, humming low around him.

With another strangled moan, he pulls back fully this time, meets her eyes hungrily for a beat before his mouth finds hers again and they're clambering up the bed, locked together, her hand scrabbling blindly at her nightstand. He takes pity on her, reaches over and gets a condom himself. She lies back on the pillows, drinking in the sight of him naked in front of her, laughs when she sees him check the condom is in date because yeah, it has been a while, and then he's lowering himself down on top of her. He brings a hand around under her shoulder, tangles it into her hair, and she can feel him hard and wanting against her thigh. "This feels so good," he murmurs, his lips against hers, nudging her nose with his.

It's all the things she never let them have in their supply closet days, gentle and vulnerable, and her heart flutters anxiously, muscle memory. _Not now, Tyler_. She tangles her leg around his, urging him closer. "I missed you."

He presses his lips to hers and slides a hand down her body, between her legs, and the moment his fingers make contact with her clit she arches frantically into him, gasping for air.

"Holy shit, Rebecca, you're -"

"Told you," she says, her breathy laugh turning into a moan as he slides his already slick fingers further and further, firm on her clit and curling inside her. He moves them slowly at first, and she's already so close, ridiculously close, her breath coming in short gasps as she rocks against his hand. He kisses her cheek, her jaw, finds his way to her earlobe and nips there with his teeth, and her fingertips dig into his back as the sensation ignites something desperate inside her – she grabs a handful of his hair, and he takes the hint, touching her rougher and faster, and she tugs his face to hers and kisses him hard as her vision narrows and the pressure builds, then she's soaring, falling apart with a strangled cry, clenching and shuddering around his fingers.

She whines when she feels him remove his fingers, but then he's sliding inside her, his face buried in her neck, and god it feels so, so good, the waves of her orgasm still rolling over her as he buries himself deep inside her and holds still, letting her adjust. "Hey," she whispers, smoothing her hands down over the muscles of his back as his hips start to rock into her, slow and deliberate. "Nathaniel?"

He jolts when she says his name, his muscles tightening, his breaths quick and uneven, and she knows from plenty of experience what that means. "Nathaniel," she repeats, and he groans against her neck, and oh, he is so far gone. "Fuck me," she whispers.

He doesn't need to be told twice – one hand in her hair and one wedged under her lower back, tilting her hips up, he sets a rhythm that has her gasping for breath. And here it is – all the emotion that kept his body still and tense earlier in the day now has him losing control, whimpering curses and praise into her neck as he drives into her over and over. She clings to him, pushes her hips up to meet him, finds the right pressure on her clit and stifles her moan in his shoulder. She's seeing stars again already, sparkles behind her eyes when she squeezes them shut, and his rhythm starts to fall apart. He stutters her name against her ear as he comes apart, dragging her with him, all four limbs wrapped tight around him as her body trembles around his.

As she comes down, her nerves still singing and eyes fluttering shut, she realises he's supporting his weight on his forearms, and drags him down on top of her. He rolls off of her – she feels him stand from the bed, and she's barely registered the cold air hitting her before he's back, on his side and rolling her toward him. She tucks herself into him and hums, contentment in every cell of her body as his arms wind tight around her and his lips press into her hair. Slowly, the post-orgasm fog lifts, and she shuffles up onto the pillows, her hand finding his cheek. His eyes are pressed tight shut. "You okay?" she checks.

"I'm definitely okay," he replies in a whisper, but makes no move to open his eyes.

She reaches down for the tangled blanket at the bottom of the bed and pulls it up over them both, smoothing it over his side. She thinks of him in his mother's sitting room doorway, gasping for air in her car, flinching away from the word _suicide_, being dragged mid anxiety attack to endless meetings about law firms and funerals, and a gnawing guilt builds in her stomach, clawing toward her throat. "It's been an intense day," she says, hesitant, her heart rate picking up.

A strangled laugh escapes him at the understatement, and he reaches for her, pulling her back into him.

"This was okay, right?" she says, muffled a little by his chest and the pounding in her ears. "I haven't…" _Ruined everything, you stupid bitch_.

"Taken advantage?" he suggests, and there's amusement in his voice that doesn't quite cut through her panic. "No. This was more than okay. This was… _So _good." He presses his face into her hair, and she tries to slow her breathing, because she believes him, logically. But there's a whole other part of her that's been waiting in the wings for a year, ready to tell her all the reasons she shouldn't have this, and apparently sex shines a light right on that asshole. But she'd anticipated that, she reminds herself. She waited until it felt right. Until she felt strong.

"Nathaniel," she whispers.

"Rebecca."

"I am so afraid I'm going to screw this up."

She feels the slow breath he takes – in, hold, out – then he's shifting them, tilting her chin up to look her in the eyes. She waits for him to speak, staring into his eyes, clear blue even in the mostly-darkness of her bedroom. He's silent for seconds that stretch into eternity, then he smiles, just a quiet little smile. "I'm not," he says. "You want to know why?"

She smiles back a little, can't help it. "Why?"

"Because you just said that, instead of running. Because there were so many times we could've run from each other today, and we didn't. I think we've both grown past defaulting to the self-destruct button." Catching her about to interrupt, he clarifies, "I'm not saying the button isn't there, Rebecca. I'm not naïve. But I don't think it's your default anymore, and I know it isn't mine."

The band around her chest loosens. _Sit your ass down, Tyler_. Because yeah, she's seen Nathaniel panic before, but she's never seen him just go through it and get to the other side without lashing out somehow – he's never reached for her hand in those moments before, and she's never felt strong enough to offer it. And in moments when she felt everything too big and high contrast and all at once and didn't know what to say to him, she didn't sit down at a keyboard to sing her way through it.

Sensing the shift in her mood, he smiles, rolls her onto her back, and her body responds immediately, her nerves igniting as he shifts down on the bed, settles between her legs and presses a kiss inside her thigh. She shivers in anticipation. "Okay?" he asks, and kisses her other thigh, nudging her legs open further.

"Which button are you pressing now?" she says, eyebrows raised, and he presses his tongue flat and firm against her clit in response – white hot electricity sparks through her and she grabs a handful of blanket, whispers, "_Yes_. Good choice. I approve." He slides his hand into hers, his thumb stroking her palm soothingly as he applies his mouth to her clit, kissing her hard and firm and hot. She's still sensitive, trembling in no time at all, clutching at his hand and definitely not missing the metaphor when she loses control completely, digging in her heels and arching off the bed and trembling all over, and his hand is still there in hers.

She comes back to her senses wrapped in his arms, the blanket back over both of them, sated and sleepy. "Nathaniel?" she murmurs.

"Yeah?"

"Thank you."

"And you. Goodnight, Rebecca."

"Goodnight." She turns, her back against his front, and pulls his arms tight around her. She feels warm and safe wrapped in his arms, and she should definitely get up to pee and possibly shower, but she's just too comfortable. She can stay gross until the morning. She closes her eyes, breathes a satisfied sigh. "Nathaniel?"

"Mmhmm?"

"Was I rusty?"

He laughs, leans around to kiss under her ear. "You were not. Was I?"

"No," she mumbles. "Very satisfying. Hey, one more question."

"Fire away."

"Does me being at the funeral with you make it better or worse? I know it's going to suck either way, but I'd like to do whatever I can to make it less terrible."

He presses his face into her hair and lays a hand over hers, threads their fingers together and squeezes. He's silent so long she starts to think he's pretending to sleep, and decides to leave it for now, then he whispers, "Better, I think."

She brings his hand up to her lips, kisses it then tucks it under her chin. His breathing evens out, and she falls into sync with him, waits until she's sure he's asleep before whispering, "I love you", trying out the words and finding they fit.

* * *

_Hi friends. Please feel free to say hi here or on tumblr or ao3 - I'm eyesontheskyline everywhere. See you soon for chapter 4._


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